New Member Hiya Audi A3 8L

[Kluedo]

As the title says new here
Have owned a number of Audi's over the years including A3's (Various) A4's (Again various) And a 100 if you are old enough to remember them?

Last year bought a A3 (8L) 130 Sport TDI Facelift model which was a spares repairs car i saw potential in and has been with me ever since this is a ongoing project however is fixed and is my daily!

Last week i took a punt on a A3 (8L Again) 1.8T Quattro sport facelift as a spares repairs (Suspected head gone) which i have managed to keep going for the moment on a bottle of steel seal.
Sniff Tested it using a kit off ebay went green straight away a bottle of steel seal later no loss of heat through the heater lovely and hot and the sniff test staying blue not had any chance as such to take out due to the lurgi that is about at the moment but the brief drive i had it seems to be a bundle of fun.

Currently in 2 minds about the 1.8T for what it owes me i may keep as a toy do the head properly and sort out the lacquer peel issues it has.

Anyway thats me i'm Dan btw and based in Kent.

 

[tigerhonaker]

Terry

 

[Sandra]

Hi Dan, welcome to audi-sport.net.

 

[k.lockU2]

Audi ....Dan... and welcome ....
steel seal ?
Now I'm curious.... as just had rocker head gasket replaced on A4 (v6 ) could smell oil . It Then went back in and was told the other side was leaking
( again smelling oil ) had it back for 2 weeks to be back in to find it was the camshaft seals right at the back right against the bulk head ... has cost me a fortune. Tell me more about this steel seal... as never heard of it ..

 

[Kluedo]

Audi ....Dan... and welcome ....
steel seal ?
Now I'm curious.... as just had rocker head gasket replaced on A4 (v6 ) could smell oil . It Then went back in and was told the other side was leaking
( again smelling oil ) had it back for 2 weeks to be back in to find it was the camshaft seals right at the back right against the bulk head ... has cost me a fortune. Tell me more about this steel seal... as never heard of it ..

The A3 was loosing water i'd say a few litres a day also had mayo in the oil cap.
The original plan was to break the 1.8 T as was worth more in parts than what i paid for it so had nothing to lose really.

Anyway tried the steel seal stuff (Cheapest i found was on eBay £26.00 or there about emptied the old water lots of rad seal looking stuff came out (Brown Sludge) sealed it back up again used some dishwasher tablets added some clean water let them dissolve and run through the car a couple of times then emptied that and ran a hose through the car until the header tank looked clean again.

Added water about 2 litres added the steel seal left it running heater on full blast for an hour as directed on the bottle (Think they say half hour) came out to the car and it was blowing cold so thought it had not worked.
The next day i went back to it tried it again and the car once warmed up was running normal blowing hot etc.

Emptied the car once again of water topped up properly with G12 taken it out various times and its not once boiled it self as it was before and the needle stays dead at 90 does not overheat at all.

Its not permanent by any stretch of the imagination (Or could be i don't know) however it has made me want to keep the car now and i will have a brand new head gasket set fitted in due course.

That i don't think will help with the problems you are having but for me for the price it's at least temporarily fixed what is a lovely car

 

[k.lockU2]

No ..... your right would not have been any good at all ...
The garage billed me for just the 1 side of rocker cover gaskets & labour ( to be fair too them ) .. later found it was camshaft bungs leaking ... however thanks for the reply & I've learnt something new .... And hopefully you will have too ... incase of oil leaks in future check them there bungs ... only detectable once left running for 20mins up on ramps though ....